


Truce

by sceawere



Series: Shelby/Solomons Verse [2]
Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Period-Typical Racism, Romani Character, Shelby/Solomons relationship, Slurs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-10
Updated: 2018-07-10
Packaged: 2019-06-08 07:43:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15238668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sceawere/pseuds/sceawere
Summary: The trouble with a Shelby dating a Solomons is...everything.Alfie has never been a man with a particular amount of tact, and sometimes he forgets that the old rules don't apply.





	Truce

“Alfie?”

A grunt came from across the room.

“Alfie?”

Another.

“Alfie?”

He sighed this time but gave no other reply besides a harsher scratch against the paper.

“Alfie!?”

“What? What do you want, woman?” he groused, and your eyebrows raised.

“Ok first, don’t refer to me as woman” you rolled onto your side to stare him down from where he was sat at the desk, scowling at you over his glasses, “and second, I’m bored”.

“I’m working” he explained, motioning to the papers spread before him.

“Yes, I know, you’ve been at it for hours now. When are we going to have some fun?”

“ **Ollie!”** he bellowed, and you sighed.

“For fucks sake, babe, can you not just get a bell or something?”

You saw Ollie come running across the floor towards the office and sat up properly, making sure your dress was pulled down at least half decent. Ever since he caught you two at it against the cabinet it had all been a case of shuffling eyes and awkward pauses.

“Yes, boss?”

“Here” Alfie held up some papers for Ollie to grab, and waved him in close, whispering something between them in their own way.

“I don’t know why you bother doing that when you know I don’t understand what you’re saying anyway” you sat back in the chair, knowing full well you were being ridiculous and sulking, but unable to stop yourself. You were bored, and frustrated, and your tolerance level was somewhere buried in the flags beneath your feet.

“Well, that’s how I feel when you and your cousins start with all the gyp-“

“If you call us fucking gypos I’ll stab you through your eye” you snapped back at Alfie before he could finish.

He ran a scratching hand through his beard, Ollie trying not to look at either of you. The mood in the room had changed. You were cranky and that had pushed you over the edge.

“Thank you, Ollie, you can leave now” you said, tone terse.

He didn’t move, instead looking to Alfie for confirmation, so you stood from the sofa, arms crossed and standing your ground.

“I said, thank you Ollie, you can leave” you enunciated each word, reinforcing your frustration.

He took it this time, eyes to the ground, shutting the door softly behind him.

“Right, you’re angry for real. I’m only joking, love, aren’t I?” Alfie’s tone had flattened out, realising his mistake.

“You’re not, and you know you’re not, and you went to fucking war over a joke about your lot, so don’t sit there and lie to me, Alfie” you turned back to him with fire in your eyes, stalking your way to the desk, “I deserve better than that”

“You do” he agreed, palms wide on the desk as he tried to placate you.

“I fucking do. I think you forget sometimes, they are still my family. I didn’t stop being one of them when I got with you. And when you say shit like that, do you realise you’re talking about me too? Do you, Alfie? Or do you forget?”

“Look, sweetheart-“

“Shove it, Alfie”

He blinked back at you and you could see him working out the best way to remove himself from this conversation without shooting you. Diplomacy was a skill he was still learning and not his natural state.

“And you’re damn right, if we break out the Shelta, it’s because we don’t want you to hear. Because my family barely trust you. And I end up having to defend you to them and it tears me apart, Alfie. I have to defend you to them, and them to you, and sometimes I wonder what the whole fucking point of it is. Tearing myself apart for the people I love, when they don’t seem to give a shit, quite frankly”

You and Alfie had joked about your situation, the strangeness of it, the borderline humour in a Shelby and Solomons partnership. But you’d never really worked through it. Never had the serious conversation and aired all the feelings. It had built up and festered and now you’d brought it up you were struggling to keep it all down.

You’d always felt at odds with something, the parts of yourself not aligning perfectly. The Lees especially had never really accepted you growing up for not having full gypsy blood and the non-travellers had never accepted you for having any gypsy blood at all. There was always a disconnect there, a struggle to find a place.

Tommy bringing you all up in the world didn’t work either, new money was looked down upon as somehow tacky. When you’d started going with Alfie it became about trying to know when to draw them together and when to tear them apart. A fracture that you couldn’t get to heal cleanly.

He fell back against his chair and you turned your back to him, perching on the edge of the desk and taking deep breathes to clear the tears from your throat.

You heard him grumble something, the creak of the chair as he rose, the gentle shuffle of the fabric drawing closer. You kept your eyes staring straight at a point in the distance, a flicker from a lamp deep in the cluster of barrels outside the office windows.

He pushed his lips to your temple first, hand snaking up to rub little circles at your jaw, gentle and fluttering, a contrast to the rough of his hands.

He grumbled again before he spoke, “I’m sorry, darlin’, I am”

“It’s not enough, Alfie”

“I’m tryin’”

“I know”

You stood together in the silence for a while, neither one of you quite sure where you wanted this to go.

“I know you’re never going to be best friends but for once I’ll like to be able to take you home without it being for a business deal. I’d like to be able to stand in a room with the people I love and not have to worry about whose gonna shoot first, yeah?”

You sighed, adjusting on your perch.

“It’s bad enough I have to think about standing at any of your gravesides soon but to think it might be you putting each other there makes me sick”

“Well, it wouldn’t be mine, let’s get that right now. If a Shelby’s putting me in the ground, it better be fucking you, love” he joked with half a smirk.

“Don’t make me laugh when I’m angry at you”

“Oh, I’m deathly serious, if you have to shoot my corpse ya better, d’ya hear me darlin’?”

“I’ll shoot you where you stand if you don’t shut up”

“See, that’s twice you’ve threatened me now, in my own office, I’m gonna have to ask one of the lads in for my own protection aren’t I?”

You were smiling now, but kept your face to the ground, shaking your head.

He stepped back into the centre of the room, hand trailing down your arm to pull you with him.

“What are you doing?” you sighed, but not fighting his efforts.

“Come here”

“Alfie?”

“Come here”

He pulled you into the centre and took your hand, twirling you round.

“Are you…dancing with me?” you asked, unsure of what the hell was going on all of a sudden.

“Yeah, well, you wanted some fun din’t ya?”

“Alfie, I’ve never seen you dance” you leaned back, frowning up at him.

“If you don’t shut up, you won’t see if now either, so get over here” he carried on grumbling to himself under his breath as you stepped close, pressing your forehead to his chest. You rocked and turned together to the sound of the rolling barrels and the chatter of the workmen and the beat of his heart under you.

“I forget sometimes, I do. I forget to…” he hummed in his throat, searching for the words.

“I don’t ever want you to stop being who you are, I wouldn’t love you the same if you did, just…turn it down sometimes, yeah?” you asked.

“I will stop with the gypsy jokes though”

You rolled your head up to look at him, nearly bashing your head against his jaw as you did.

“No, you won’t” you voice was incredulous and you shook your head at him.

“No, well…I probably won’t, you’re right” he coughed and you laughed at him under your breath.

“I will stab you if you call us gypos, though”

“That’s fair” he agreed.

“Ollie!”

It was his turn to wince as you bellowed out behind you, turning in his arms. The door clicked open and he popped his head in warily, wondering what he was about to walk into. Usually when you fought, it ended with something he didn’t want to see.

“Uh, yeah boss?”

“I need you to write something down for me” you instructed.

He stood confused for a moment, then came into the room and fished in his pocket for his notebook.

“Right, what’s happening here?” Alfie asked, motioning between you.

“You’ll see” you brought your hand up to pat at his chest over your shoulder, keeping your eyes on Ollie to check he was ready.

“I need you to write: ‘Alfie Solomons formally accepts the consequence of physical harm if he is to utter the word ‘gypo’ against any member of the Shelby family, or their affiliates’ – have you got that?”

“Right, no, don’t write that” Alfie reached out, but you slapped his hand away.

“Write it, Ollie” you instructed.

“No”

“Yes, you said it”

“Not with witnesses” Alfie gave a breathless, incredulous laugh.

“Oh! No, I’m not having that, you’re not pulling that”

“I’ve told you a thousand times-“

“Who the fuck do you think I am?”

“I know, don’t I? But if you’re gonna-“

“I wrote it” Ollie interrupted.

Both of you turned to Ollie who was holding the notebook page up where both could see it and Alfie scowled at him.

“You just need to sign it, both of you”

“Traitor” Alfie muttered, ignoring your beaming smile as you bounced on your toes. Now you were enjoying yourself.

“No, Alfie, I heard you, from outside. I think both of you forget this whole place is made of glass in the middle of a very echoey warehouse” he waved his pencil around the space and by the look on his face you knew he wasn’t talking just about the argument you just had.

“Oh, well…”

“Pass me the fucking paper, fucking hell, getting it from all sides today” he shuffled over to pick up a pen from the desk and signed the bottom of the page before handing it to you.

You looped your name under his and marked it with a dot at the end.

“There” you turned to him and pulled his face down for a kiss “all sorted”

Ollie grabbed the notepad and shuffled off as quick as he could, worried he was about to witness a reconciliation.

“Ya happy now?”

“I’m happy”

“Good, I need to finish these-“he moved to pull away from you but you kept your grip on his cheeks firm, pulling his gaze back to you.

“We’re getting ice cream now, Alfie” you insisted.

“Ice Cream?”

“Ice Cream”

“Right, we can’t get Ice Cream though, can we? Because that would mean going over the border to the Italians and-“

“We’ll pay some kid to run over and back for us, come on, Mr Solomons, where is your sense of adventure? I thought you were a big hard-man, don’t disappoint me now” you teased.

“I’ve never disappointed you ever, right, and apparently everyone who works on the other side of that glass has full knowledge and understanding of that”

You bit your lip and tried to keep your laugh in, his smile spreading to match yours.

“Am I really that loud?” you whispered with a frown.

“Fucking terrible, you are”

“I’ve never heard you complain”

“Wouldn’t fucking dare, would I?”

He put a kiss to your forehead and you savoured the moment. A truce, for now.


End file.
